Second Democratic Debate Draws 18.1M

Thursday night’s Democratic presidential primary debate drew 18.1 million viewers, far outstripping the audience of Wednesday’s initial debate that featured another roster of 10 candidates vying for the nomination.

The Wall Street Journal reports the spike makes Thursday night’s event the most-watched Democratic debate ever, according to Comcast Corp.’s NBCUniversal, which aired the debate on three of its networks.

Neither of this week’s debates topped the 24 million viewers who tuned in to the first Republican debate of the 2016 cycle on Fox News, which featured the top 10 Republican presidential hopefuls and included then-candidate Donald Trump, a reliable ratings juggernaut.

The previous record for a Democratic primary debate—15.8 million viewers on CNN—was set in October 2015, when a lineup of five candidates including former party nominee Hillary Clinton and current candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (D., Vt.) participated in the first Democratic debate of the 2016 election cycle.

Onstage Thursday night were 10 democratic hopefuls—half of the 20 candidates participating in this week’s debates—including former Vice President Joe Biden, Mr. Sanders, Sen. Kamala Harris of California, Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Ind., and Marianne Williamson, a self-help guru.

Wall Street Journal graphic

Ratings for Thursday night’s debate were expected to be higher than Wednesday’s 15.3 million, since front-runners were skewed toward the second night. Compared with Wednesday’s debate, viewership rose by 2.8 million viewers, or 19%.

NBC saw the highest ratings among the three networks that aired the debate, with about 10.6 million viewers, according to Nielsen. MSNBC attracted 6.7 million, and about 840,000 tuned in via Spanish-language network Telemundo.

Although the kickoff to the primary season has come early, with the 2020 election still more than 16 months out, anticipation for this week’s debates has been high. Ad spots were priced accordingly, with 30-second spots on MSNBC going for as much as $100,000, according to people familiar with the matter.